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Beefing up your home's security

WASHINGTON -- April 4, 2005 -- Want to feel a little more secure in your own home? Think like a criminal.

What are your home's weak spots, the places that an intruder can easily access? Once you pinpoint them, examine the ways you can you strengthen your defenses.

Start by looking at your lifestyle and what you are trying to prevent. Do you want to guard against burglars, who frequently strike when the home is empty? Or are you more worried about home invasions, which occur when people are home? Are you high-tech or low-tech? Do you want something that sets off flashing lights and sirens or a silent alarm?

Good security is a matter of layering, says Chris McGoey, president of McGoey Security Consulting and author of "Security: Adequate or Not?" He recommends starting with low-tech improvements.

"Low-tech is consistent," he says. "Once it's in place, it's in place. It doesn't require assistance, like other monitoring systems or sensors, to detect. If you do the low-tech stuff first and add onto it, every layer added on works more."

Monitor mania

When considering home security, many people choose a system monitored by a third party. If that appeals to you, it pays to shop around.

Have the security company rep walk you through exactly what happens when your alarm goes off. Who will be responding? If it's the police, what is the average response time and what kind of priority will the call get? If it's being answered by an alarm company, how many patrol cars do they have and how large an area do they cover? How often are they near your block in a given night? And what's the policy for adding more cars and patrolmen as they acquire more customers?

"The thing for people to really remember is that generally the police won't be there for five to six minutes, and the alarm company will not be there even that fast," says Dan Sullivan, retired deputy chief of the Los Angeles police department and president of Investigative Services Corp. "If the alarm goes off, the company will call you to see if you pushed your alarm."

Don't take jargon for granted. If a company touts "armed" response, have reps define the term, says Sullivan. Do they carry guns? Do they have instructions to shoot intruders?

Many services also advertise panic buttons. What do they guarantee? What is the response time? What happens if no one answers the door? If you're on the floor with a medical emergency, someone standing outside doesn't help.

Verify their answers with your local police department. And try to get a feel for what the cops think of the company and system, especially for the crimes prevalent in your area.

While you're chatting with the police, ask about false alarms. Many jurisdictions will allow you to have a couple of false-alarm calls before they start charging you a fee. Find out how many "strikes" you get and what the charge is when you exceed it.

In general, monitored systems tend to work better for businesses, where the purpose is to protect property, than in homes, where the purpose is to prevent or stop crime in time to protect people, says Sullivan.

Hiring a company to monitor your alarm runs about $20 to $30 a month, says Mark Visbal, senior associate director of standards and technology for the Security Industry Association, a trade group. Many companies offer a package deal: low-cost installation along with a multiyear monitoring contract with monthly fees. Typically, says Visbal, companies cover their installation costs after 16 to 18 months.

The one-time price to install an unmonitored system? "A fair guess would be about $1,500," says Visbal.

"Monitoring is really for fire," says McGoey. "Police almost never respond to an alarm in time to catch a burglar."

Do it yourself

If you don't need third-party security monitoring, consider setting up your own system. The do-it-yourself approach allowed Gordon Meyer to craft a system that fits his needs.

"If something is amiss, I can connect back to my house via a Web browser and see what's going on," says Meyer, author of "Smart Home Hacks." In an emergency, police get a live call, not a signal that someone's alarm is ringing, he says.

Meyer runs his system off an old Mac computer with $150 worth of software. He uses a broadband connection, which many technophiles will have anyway, and when he set up his security, his built-in Web servers cost about $100 each. Similar new technology now starts at about $200.

"The neat thing is that once you've spent about $350, expanding it out to do more is not that much more expensive," he says. "It's like a tinker toy or erector set, once you make that initial investment."

Home stores carry a lot of the basics, says Meyer, including the following. Glass-break detectors: Because you put them in the room and not every window, you don't need that many, says Meyer. The cost is roughly $20 to $60. Door sensors: If doors open, an alarm sounds. "One of the most economical ways, if you are doing a system yourself, is to do sensors on interior doors that you close when you leave the house," says Meyer. One of his friends set up a system just that way and when it gets a signal that one of the interior doors has been opened and no one is supposed to be home, "he's pretty confident that something's going on," Meyer says. Depending on the type, they can average from $3 to $45. Interior motion detectors: If someone makes it inside, these will let you know. They can be a problem, however, if you have pets. Motion detectors run upwards of $20 to $100.

You also can turn your residence into a "smart" or automated home. For minimal cost, plug in standard timers to turn on lights or radios when you're not there. A bit more trouble (and money) will let you set up a system so that you turn on the timers remotely from anywhere. Other features could allow you to turn up the heat or even fire up the hot tub in advance of your arrival.

But if you're a beginning do-it-yourselfer or want something more basic, you can get a starter kit, says Meyer. Instead of connecting to cameras and computers, this is a more plain-vanilla system that will use phone lines. Prices start at about $200.

Wired vs. wireless

If you're thinking of going wireless, Meyer recommends two options: Z-wave and X-10.

Z-wave, a wireless protocol for devices, allows you to put in temperature sensors, door sensors and motion detectors so that "they all sort of talk to each other wirelessly," Meyer says. The downside: "The devices are a little expensive right now."

Most do-it-yourself security systems tend to use X-10 technology, Meyer says. With X-10, sensors don't communicate with each other, but instead operate independently of each other. "It's a simpler and less robust way of doing it," Meyer says. "It's also less expensive."

When installing your own system, Meyer says to be wary of going with leading-edge technology. While he believes that the newer Z-wave technology will be around for a while, he says a lot of things come on the market and quickly go away.

Going wireless offers a huge savings in labor since you don't have to run physical connections, but it does have its drawbacks. Wireless systems operate on batteries that need to be replaced periodically and, depending on the frequency, interference is a possibility, says Visbal.

Security details

Whether you put in your own system or have it professionally installed, make sure some redundancy is built in, says Meyer. If one alarm works off the phone line and that's out, what's your backup?

Think in terms of zones. "I like arming the perimeter separately from the inside," says McGoey. When you go to bed at night, you can set the alarms for just the perimeter; when you're out of the house, you set both.

Realize that while alarms add one more layer of security, nothing is absolute. "If you think an alarm system is foolproof, it isn't," says Sullivan.

Contact your home insurance agent. If your policy gives you a discount for security enhancements, make sure your policy reflects the changes you've added to your home.

And consider the human element. If you have a system installed by an alarm company, don't let the technician off your property until you and your family are comfortable with the setup and all its literal bells and whistles.

"Make sure that everyone in the house has been bought into what you want to do and that it won't be problematic or a burden for them," Meyer says. A security system that isn't used won't do you any good.

© 2005 Bankrate.com Inc., April 4, 2005.